


ex-lifeguard

by gay_writes_with_mac



Series: Platonic Oneshots [6]
Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Drowning, Friendship, Gen, no ships, this is very self-indulgent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-15
Updated: 2020-07-15
Packaged: 2021-03-05 05:00:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,113
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25288708
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gay_writes_with_mac/pseuds/gay_writes_with_mac
Summary: The plan was supposed to be simple. Then all hell broke loose.
Relationships: Maggie Greene & Jesus, Tara Chambler & Daryl Dixon, Tara Chambler & Jesus, Tara Chambler & Maggie Greene
Series: Platonic Oneshots [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1793905
Comments: 4
Kudos: 9





	ex-lifeguard

The sensation of the bridge falling out from underneath him is the most terrifying thing he’s ever felt.

The plan was supposed to be simple. Divert the herd using old CDs and car horns. Get them through the woods to the tall wooden bridge. Lead them onto the ancient old wood and set it ablaze. Problem solved. No more herd.

But there was no getting a car across that bridge without risking sending the driver into the watery depths below, so the walker bait had to be on foot. And who better for walker bait than Hilltop’s fearless runner?

One moment he’s standing there safely on the wood, watching the fire lick up the reanimated corpses of the walkers, and then the next the wood is turning to ash and empty space beneath his feet and he’s plummeting towards the unforgiving surface of the rapid current beneath him.

The water seems to swallow him as he falls, its vast maw sucking him beneath the turbulent flow, and he remembers that they put out a flash flood warning a few days ago when the river reached such a high point. He sinks all the way down to the stony riverbed like a rock. The stones scrape at his skin, the dirty water stinging the cuts littering every inch of exposed skin as the river drags him forwards. He thrashes, tries to fight back, but he never learned how to swim, and the heavy trench coat and layers of clothing underneath only drag him down, entangling around his legs and pushing him further and further under the surface of the water.

His lungs are screaming. The panic is overwhelming. Every inch of him is screeching for air that he can’t get, black spots and dizziness threatening to overwhelm him. He’s lost all control - feels something brush against him -

The massive rock smacks into his head, a white-hot flash of pain shooting through his skull. He sucks in a breath on reflex, water filling his lungs, and it _burns._ He tries to cough and that only sucks in more, and his limbs feel so heavy, and his eyes are threatening to close more and more with every faint, fluttering heartbeat…

He lets his eyes close and his body relax into the flow of the current, fading away into nothingness.

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“He should have come back up by now.”

Tara stares down into the turbulent waters where Jesus disappeared without a trace, looking for any sign of her friend resurfacing. “It’s been almost a minute. He could be dying down there.”

“There’s nothing we can do,” Rick says, for the third time since Jesus fell. “We can’t risk any more.”

“He put himself in danger to take out this herd.” Tara turns to look up at him, and her eyes suddenly feel suspiciously damp. “You said we needed a man on the bridge to draw them, and he volunteered. He stood on a burning bridge and made himself bait for two hundred walkers, and you’d let him drown?”

“Tara, there’s nothing we can-”

“Yeah, yeah, right, nothing we can do. You said.” Tara swallows hard, returning her gaze intently to the river.

Something bobs up at the edge, just around the bend of the river, by a massive, algae-covered boulder. For one moment she’s filled with relief, and then her heart jumps into her throat when she realizes that it’s Jesus’s grey beanie.

 _Just_ his grey beanie.

Before Rick can stop her, Tara takes a running start and dives into the river from the crumbled edge of the bridge, hitting the water hands-first with a deep inhale. She’s no professional, but she worked a few summers as a lifeguard at the community pool to help pay for college, and she cuts through the water easily enough, letting the current help instead of hinder her. She surfaces briefly, sucks in another gasp of air - she can hear Rick screaming at her all the way back at the bridge but she doesn’t have time to even smirk - and then dives back under, groping along the riverbed and finding only stones, relying more on touch than sight.

Until her hand closes around a fistful of familiar leather and she latches on tightly, her knuckles going white as she strokes upward, dragging him along with her. She breaks the surface of the water and swims for the bank, kicking frantically with her legs with both hands grabbing onto handfuls of his coat. Her muscles are burning with exertion, adrenaline coursing through her veins, pushing her forward to the sandy bank. 

A hand suddenly appears out of nowhere, extending out to her, and Tara latches on, letting a strong arm haul her up and onto the bank, the back of Jesus’s coat still clutched in her opposite fist. It’s Maggie coming to her aid, she realizes, and Tara nods to her, both of them helping drag Jesus’s limp body out of the water. He’s not moving, Tara realizes, and the trickle of water coming from his parted lips has to mean he inhaled some. She kneels down by his side - sand is covering every inch of both of them, clinging to her hair and her lips and her hands, rubbing her skin raw - searching for a pulse, for any sign of breath. “He’s not breathing.”

Sandy hands fumbling, she opens up the trenchcoat, starting compressions. She fished more than a few kids out of the pool after a few shrieks for help during her lifeguarding days, but it never got to this point, and substituting a heartbeat for her real life friend is nothing like the plastic dummy she had to resuscitate during her CPR certification. 

She can feel Maggie’s hand on her shoulder, lending her strength and support as Jesus’s ribs crack under her hands. _That’s how I know I’m doing it right,_ she tells herself firmly, deliriously humming “Stayin’ Alive” under her breath to keep the right pace.

Jesus‘s unconscious body suddenly convulses under her hands and Tara jerks back, startled but nearly sobbing with relief. “Turn him, he’s gonna vomit-”

With Maggie’s help, she gets him on his side just in time for him to retch, a gush of muddy water pouring out onto the sand. Suddenly exhausted, trembling from exertion, Tara rubs his back slowly, drenched to the bone and covered in sand. “I’ve - I’ve got him, get a towel or a blanket or something, he’s shivering-”

Maggie pats her shoulder quickly and then she’s gone and they’re alone on the bank, filthy and exhausted, shivering from the freezing current. Jesus coughs up another gush of water, his eyes visibly streaming from the effort. “Good, that’s good…just keep coughing. Get all that out…” Tara murmurs quietly, her hand lingering on his back. “Just keep coughing…”

Warm hands on her shoulders, and Maggie peels away Tara’s dripping jacket, leaving her in a soaked-through grey tank top and jeans. Then there’s a blanket around her shoulders, soft and warm and dry, and Tara huddles under the fleecy fabric, suddenly almost asleep on the bank. The others are coming now, out of the woods and away from their posts to check on them. Tara’s fingers close around his wrist and won’t let go. She doesn’t want to let go. The image of that fucking grey beanie bobbing up in the current won’t fade away. It plays over and over in her mind like a broken record, that moment of terror when she realized that he wasn’t coming back up on his own.

“C’mon,” a gruff voice says suddenly, a rough hand closing around her arm. Tara looks up into Daryl’s eyes, his dog licking her chin comfortingly, tail wagging wildly as he stands by his side. “Catch your death out here. Inside, now.”

“Jesus…?” Tara asks shakily, her voice wavering more than she thought it would when she speaks.

“We’ll get him too. Siddiq’ll look him over, but he’s gonna be fine.” There’s plenty of people that might tell her comforting lies, but Daryl isn’t one of them, so Tara lets him pull her to her feet, Jesus’s hand slipping from her grip. The moment she stands, though, she sways on her feet, suddenly overwhelmed with dizziness, her knees threatening to give. Daryl makes a noncommittal huff that she can’t make any sense of, and then her feet leave the ground and she’s being carried, rocked slowly as they leave the riverbank behind.

Behind them, they pick up Jesus too, and they’re gentle enough that she knows he must be alive, and then her eyes are too heavy to keep open for another moment and she lets herself fade away into unconsciousness.

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Tara’s fingers tap nervously on the side of her bed. She’s too worried to read the book Maggie brought her, having barely skimmed a few pages before giving up on it. She feels _fine,_ not even cold anymore, but according to Daryl, her lips and nails turned blue as he was bringing her back to the infirmary, and so Siddiq wants her close to monitor her for hypothermia. Just one more night, he said. So Tara’s staying one more night, and waiting desperately for Jesus to get the same all-clear.

“Hey.” Tara looks up at once, and there’s Maggie in the doorway, smiling. “He’s awake. Wants to see you.”

“He’s awake?” Tara jumps to her feet at once, her head still spinning slightly in protest. “Is he okay? He’s gonna be okay?”

“Breathin’s good. Lungs are clear. He’s tired. Still recoverin’. But he’ll be fine. You saved him, T.” Maggie reaches out, offering Tara an arm to steady her. “Didn’t know you could swim that good.”

“Lifeguarded a few summers,” Tara offers, accepting the arm. “Community pool. CPR certificate, all that. I’ve never had to _use it_ before, though…”

“Wouldn’t have known. If we ever build a pool around here, I might have a job for you.” Maggie opens the door slowly, letting Tara into one of the small rooms in the infirmary. Jesus is still pale, propped up on pillows, but he’s awake, and Tara abandons Maggie’s arm to perch on the side of the bed, her feet dangling a few inches above the ground. 

“Tara…?” His hand is still a little cold as it finds hers, but Tara latches on anyway, laughing softly.

“In the flesh. Thought you were a goner there for a minute or two.”

Maggie quietly closes the door behind them, leaving them alone in the room. “Yeah, me too.” Jesus chuckles too, but it turns into a coughing fit, and Tara winces, resting her free hand on his shoulder. “Sorry...sorry, still a little...you know.”

“Yeah.” Tara rubs his shoulder soothingly. “I know. Don’t be sorry.”

“I’ve been told you fished me out. Saved my ass.” 

Tara shrugs, suddenly shy. It’s odd to think of herself as anybody’s savior. But he’s not technically wrong, and so she tentatively owns it, feeling her cheeks flush pink. “I guess. I’m a pretty solid swimmer. Couldn’t save your hat, thought, may it rest in peace.”

“I’ll forgive you on the grounds that you apparently risked your life to fish me out of a river.” Jesus suddenly flushes, his hand tightening hers. “The current general consensus is that I hit my head when I fell and got knocked out, and I’d like it to stay that way. So if I tell you something, I need you to take it to your grave, okay?”

“Cross my heart.” Tara nods at once, squeezing his hand back. “Your secret’s safe with me.”

“...I don’t know how to swim.”

“Wait, that’s it?” Tara laughs, shaking her head. “Dude, we all have our flaws. Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone that the great _Son of God_ is anything less than perfect in every way.”

“...I’d call you an asshole, but you threw yourself into a flooding river to save me, so I don’t think I can do that right now.”

“Damn right you can’t.” Tara swats his arm lightly, rolling her eyes. “If you want to learn, I was licensed to give swim tests and lessons before. If you don’t - for fuck’s sake, maybe don’t be the guy volunteering to stand on a burning bridge?”

“Someone had to.”

“Yeah, someone who can _swim_ if they fall in the _river_ directly _underneath them_ -”

“This is the most homophobic thing I’ve ever heard.”

“I am literally also gay.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever.” Jesus sighs, his eyelids starting to flutter. “Okay...hey, before I pass out again...thanks, Tara. I didn’t want to die there. Especially not like that.”

“Yeah, I didn’t want you to die there either, idiot. Get some sleep. I’ll stick around.”


End file.
